It is well known that a ballast structure is needed to control the energization of a fluorescent lamp. Such ballasts may be wholly magnetic devices or may be electronic in nature to permit the driving of the fluorescent lamp at a high frequency which reduces the size of magnetic components and improves lamp efficacy.
There are a variety of lamp fixtures to which ballasts are mounted. For example, some fixtures, known as a compact fluorescent down lights have structures, depending on the manufacturer, which mount the ballast either by screw connection or removable prong and snap connection. Similarly, high hat type fixtures usually require ballast mounting by bolting extending ears of the ballast to the fixture interior. Ballasts may be mounted in a variety of locations with leads extending through various surfaces of the ballast into a junction box of the fixture.
This large variety of ballast mounting configurations has required a large number of mounting geometries for ballasts, causing large inventories and mounting difficulties in the field if the installer does not have the right mounting structure.
It would be desirable to provide a ballast for fluorescent lamps which could be universally mounted to a wide variety of lamp fixtures for initial or retrofit application.